We're in the midst of a wave of horror movies that take well-worn concepts and refresh them with unusual perspectives. In a Violent Nature told its standard slasher plot from the POV of its Jason Vorhees-like killer. Presence was a haunted house thriller shot from the first person perspective of a ghost. Skinamarink was...well, whatever Skinamarink was. Ben Leonberg's directorial debut Good Boy is a horror movie with a rather unremarkable plot about a man succumbing to a malevolent spirit in a haunted house, but what makes the film remarkable is its perspective, that of a dog.
In horror movies, dogs tend to either be disposable victims who die even before the black guy or frothing emissaries of evil. It's practically unheard of to see one carry a movie on their back as a heroic figure. Wayne Smith's novel 'Thor' told its werewolf story from the POV of a family dog but when the novel was adapted as the 1996 movie Bad Moon that perspective was dropped. Good Boy gives us some idea of how Bad Moon might have played out had it stayed faithful to its source.
Our hero hound is Indy, played by Leonberg's own dog of the same name. When his terminally ill owner Todd (Shane Jensen) moves into the remote home he inherited from his late grandfather (played in video footage by indie horror staple Larry Fessenden), Indy immediately senses danger. While Todd remains oblivious, Indy sees sinister shadows in the night, along with the ghost of Todd's grandfather's own dog. When a demonic figure caked in a gooey black substance begins to appear, Indy must try his best to keep Todd safe.
Inspired by Tom & Jerry cartoons, Leonberg keeps his camera mostly at his canine protagonist's level, with Todd and other humans largely heard offscreen. This greatly adds to the sense of vulnerability, taking us back to our childhoods when so much of the world seemed threatening from our tiny perspectives. The movie is low on jump scares, favouring a creeping sense of dread, with Leonberg mining much tension from our anticipation of threats emerging at the end of hallways or from the darkness of the woods that surround the setting.
The classic editing technique of the Kuleshov effect is Leonberg's main tool here. By juxtaposing Indy's expressive face with creepy potential threats, Leonberg creates the impression that his canine lead is giving a fully rounded performance and is actually reacting to spectres rather than simply waiting to be rewarded with a doggy treat. In screen acting less is usually more, and a few actors could do worse than study how much Indy projects with a blank expression.
While Todd is threatened with potentially harmful spirits, he's also rapidly succumbing to his chronic lung disease, regularly spitting up buckets of blood. One way to read the film is that the house isn't actually haunted, that the sinister figure Indy envisions is simply representative of his sensing of Todd's illness (dogs are famously able to "smell" cancer and other human ailments). Whether you buy that interpretation or not, Good Boy certainly functions as an allegory for the ravages of disease. We know early on that Todd's time is limited, and the film has a tragic and melancholic undertone as a result. There's something deeply sad in watching Indy desperately attempt to save his doomed master, and I couldn't help but think of how often you hear stories of dogs being found at the side of owners who passed away alone. Good Boy has enough atmosphere to function as an effective horror movie, but it stands out as a tribute to the unconditional love of man's best friend.
Directed by: Ben Leonberg
Starring: Indy the dog, Shane Jensen, Arielle Friedman, Larry Fessenden
